Volunteers welcome to make maple syrup at Flanders

Published 1:34 pm, Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Harry Gerowe demonstrates how to tap a tree for maple sap at Flanders in 2014.

Harry Gerowe demonstrates how to tap a tree for maple sap at Flanders in 2014.

Photo: Contributed Photo

Volunteers welcome to make maple syrup at Flanders

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WOODBURY >> Maple sugaring in New England goes back to the Native Americans who began tapping the sweet sap and distilling it. At Flanders Nature Center & Land Trust, the tradition of turning that sap into syrup goes back at least 50 years and each year locals are invited to help.

The center is looking for volunteers to help out throughout the season’s maple sugaring process — from tree tapping this Saturday to sap collection, bottling and giving historical and educational presentations in March.

“It’s a program that has become a tradition for families for a lot of years,” said Nancy Robinson, communications director at Flanders. “My girls are now 25 and 28 and we’ve been doing it now for years. It’s a neat way to know that spring is around the corner.”

For tree-tapping day on Saturday, volunteers will gather at Flanders Sugar House, 5 Church Hill Road in Woodbury, at 9:30 a.m. After a demonstration of how to tap the trees, they will disperse in two groups to tap nearly 300 trees on Flanders property and throughout downtown Woodbury.

“We invite people of all ages and truly, it’s all volunteer with families coming out each year,” Robinson said. “It’s a really fun thing to do it. It does require drilling into a tree and Harry Gerowe gives a little demonstration to begin with on the right way to do it.”

With so many trees, Flanders needs a lot of help. Typically, the nonprofit organization sees about 20 volunteers who remain involved throughout the sugaring season, with 10 or 20 more than that helping on tree tapping day.

“We drill about an inch and a half hole into the tree at a slight upward angle so the sap flows out of the tree into the spout. We put a lid on the bucket to keep the majority of the rain out because the sap is already about 97 percent water,” explained Amber McDonald, of Flanders. “We then take it from a 3 percent sugar content up to 66 percent.”

That means 40 gallons of sap are required to make just one bottle of syrup. Most years, Flanders volunteers and staff produce about 80 gallons, which are sold in the nature center store. Some years the number is higher, others lower, depending on the weather.

The buckets fill with sap in about a day and a half, McDonald said, so buckets are emptied every other day until the season ends. Once the days get warmer, the sap will stop flowing or turn bright yellow.

“That means the sugar content is going more toward the tree to produce buds for the season,” McDonald said. “We hope to get at least a six-week season.”

Once the sap is collected, it’s taken to the Flanders sugar house to be evaporated, then bottled and sold at the store. The process is on display during the first three weekends in March, when the public is invited to learn about maple sugaring.

The annual pancake breakfast is held Sunday, March 1, from 8 a.m. to noon at the Woodbury Emergency Services Building on Quassuk Road. There’s all-you-can-eat pancakes and sausages with all the fixings, including Flanders own maple syrup. The cost is $7 for adults, $5 for children ages 5 to 11 and children under 5 are free.

“We mainly do it for the educational aspect, to teach people about maple sugaring,” McDonald said. “When we have our demos we talk about how the Native Americans discovered the maple syrup and from there the colonists improved the system, up until the present day.”

“And it’s about getting the community out and seeing what you can do in your own backyard,” she said. “Anybody can do it, even if you’ve only got a few maple trees.”

Anyone interested in helping with the maple sugaring process at Flanders is asked to call 203-263-3711, ext. 12, to register or email flanders@flandersnaturecenter.org.